In Limbo We Trust
by wistfulwatcher
Summary: It's about trust. Really, it's about a lot of things, but trust is at the beginning of it all.  ETA:  won't allow asterisks. I've reformatted the fic for here, and it probably makes more sense now!


Ten years later, they're both performing in New York.

She's on Broadway, successful.

He's not.

()()()

Their reunion is clichéd, the sweet set-up of a summer chick flick; a spilled cup of hard earned black coffee, mumbled apologies and the smallest brush of fingers.

Ten years ago she would have called it serendipity.

The word she tastes now is _calamity_.

()()()

That first meeting turns into a planned second, third, fourth.

She's surprised when she realizes that she's the one nervous about this reconnection.

He's surprised when he realizes that seeing her is the only thing he looks forward to anymore.

()()()

When she mumbles into the phone and hedges his suggestion for a fifth meeting, he mumbles his understanding and hangs up.

An hour later he has tickets to her next show. They're expensive, and it means much less heat this October.

It's alright; the thought of her is warming him.

()()()

She wasn't shy around him that first day, the second or third. It was the fourth cup of coffee that changed things, he thinks.

He goes back to her dressing room hoping to find that Rachel, bright Rachel.

Shy Rachel makes him itch, and it's a feeling he both dreads and anticipates.

()()()

The security guard takes his sweet time in seeing if _Ms. Berry_ would like to see any visitors.

She does.

When she agrees she wrings her hands and bites her lip, draws blood at the knock.

()()()

Her dressing room is bright, seemingly happy, but he notices the smiling pictures on the wall are all of glee, college, her first show. The bouquets littering the spare surfaces of her space are all wilting, dead.

Times stops in here; nothing has survived the past few years judging by her tight smile.

"Will," her tone is weak, resigned, exhausted.

He's not sure what she thinks he's asking for.

But her answer is _no._

()()()

They both continue on, continue to perform. To pretend.

()()()

He likes to think he's stopped thinking about her; the littlest thing doesn't bring her name to his mind, anymore.

When he whispers her name in the dark, his hand beneath the sheet, he realizes the appearance of her name isn't noticeable because now it's always there.

He continues doing what he does best, does his blocking like he's supposed to.

()()()

It's raining, storming; cliché, but it doesn't feel that way when he hears a knock at the door, hesitant but persistent.

It's gaining momentum.

She's drenched, he thinks she must have walked to his apartment, the dingy studio in the bad part of the bad part of town.

He plays his part, says his lines but his delivery is tight, forced.

()()()

He gives her coffee or tea or something in a mug that burns her hand and makes her shiver.

"Will," her tone is the same as at the theatre.

The mug shatters but she doesn't notice, not with her back pressed against the edge of the counter, digging into her flesh through the thin, wet shirt as his fingers leave bruises on her hip, her thighs.

"Rachel," it's a growl, a plea. It's a demand so she tilts her head back to look at him.

His teeth leave dark red marks on the column of her throat but she can't focus long enough to care, not when he's lifting her, dropping her hard onto the top of the linoleum surface.

He lies her back with a hand between her breasts, kisses the flesh bared above her waistband until her head drops over the edge of the hard surface beneath her.

They're brutal together, like this, and when he pushes himself against her, slides in easily to the hilt, she scratches at his chest and cries _harder_ until they're certain the bruises will remain for days.

()()()

It's like this from then on; hard and unforgiving.

He never goes to her, not after the theatre, but when they have their time together is the extent of her control.

She leaves herself, _the star_, at the door so Will, not _her teacher_, can fuck her, can pull at her hair and bite at her thighs until she's begging for more, she needs just a little _more_.

()()()

They don't name what they do, what this is, what they are.

Titles like _dominant_ and _submissive_ aren't completely foreign concepts to them but they've both been in high school long enough to despise labels.

()()()

It's about trust, when they come together.

Really, it's about the past and the future, payback and affirmation, need, desire and passion and release.

But at the beginning of all of that is trust.

()()()

It's a gradual thing; a _yes, sir_ as a joke and a firm _that's right_, to make her smile but the only teeth they bare is to bite and their jokes are only real offers they hesitated to make.

()()()

They both think they understand what the other wants, and maybe they have.

What makes this a success, makes them successful is that they've figured out what the other _needs_.

()()()

"Kneel," he gasps against her mouth before dropping his worthless, flat pillow to the ground.

She follows his orders immediately, the time for hesitation long gone; they've committed to this now.

He sits on the edge of his bed, her between his thighs and groans and gasps and tugs at her hair, _hard_.

He comes like that, too, _hard_ and when he no longer feels her mouth around him he tugs her up, splays her on the bed.

"Give me your wrists."

She does it silently, squirming from the steady pulse between her thighs, unable to soothe the ache, her thighs too slick with her own desire.

Her head presses into his hard mattress, watches as he straddles her waist, presses her into the sheets as he lifts her hands to the headboard, ties her to it with a silk scarf he doesn't explain.

()()()

"Oh God, oh _yes, please!_" She's whimpering and begging and crying and thrusting her hips back against his behind her.

His knuckles are white from gripping her hips, his lips are tight, sweat on his brow as he brings his hand down, _hard_, leaves red marks on the smooth skin of her ass.

"I asked you a question." _Slap_. "Give me a proper answer," he growls but it catches in his throat at the sight of her, hair sticking to her neck, biting her lip and nails digging into the corner of the cheap rug he'd bought last week.

He's merciless; there are no tender touches, no sweet kisses.

Neither of them want that.

Neither of them _need _that.

What she needs is the firm grip of his hand, his voice, guiding her actions and telling her what to do, what to say, when to feel; she needs his direction.

What he needs is the soft cries torn from her throat, her fingers, begging him and pleading and pulling on him to make her feel; he needs her attention.

()()()

Her cries are muffled beneath that same silk scarf that holds her wrists, her ankles sometimes, and even blinds her occasionally. She's the one deprived of something, always, but it's always his mind that needs moments to catch up on what happened after they come, fall over the edge he pushes them toward.

()()()

"Come, Rachel," he's grunting, their skin is sliding together and making harsh noises around them. "_Fuck_, come _now_," and she does, her hair knotting beneath his fingers against her shoulder blades, his cock pressing deep inside, brushing the soft flesh that sends tight coils of _almost_ through her.

"Yes, _sir_," it's a drawn out moan, not _Will_, not _Mr. Schuester_; this is the compromise they've found, the term to match the limbo in which this moment exists.

()()()

She doesn't spend the night; he doesn't ask her to.

She has to appear in front of a sold out house in sixteen hours.

He has to appear in back of a cash register in six.

()()()

He pins her to the door before she leaves, jacket not quite on, and pulls her hair back from her neck.

He hears her breath catch, still, after all these times, and she smiles, dark, before he scrapes his teeth along the skin below her ear.

She nods, her eyes flutter and she exits the apartment before she submits to him again.

()()()

They continue like this for longer than either had expected.

It's fine until Rachel's name lands in the tabloids outside of a man's door.

It's fine until Will's name is not synonymous with the owner of the apartment.

()()()

They don't stop what they're doing; they change it.

Will shows up at her door and she answers it.

They're not isolated, they're not a game anymore.

()()()

"_Whose_?"

Her eyes are pressed tight, her teeth clenched, but her pain is second to the relief she feels.

"_Yours, _sir," the word she emphasizes is new, and he comes to the sound of it on her lips between her gasps.

()()()

When they choose this, _them_, it's ultimately about trust.

They decide it's not normal or healthy or what they should want but they do; they decide to commit to this, to them like this.

He trusts her to stop him, to make her lines and make him follow; he's never been good in charge of those boundaries.

She trusts him to listen, to take her at face value and want her because she's _her_, she's what's in front of him; it's all she thinks she's ever wanted.

()()()

He pins her to their table, lays her across it and spreads her legs so he can taste her.

"Please, _Will_," and they're more than they were months ago, more than they were years ago but they think these lines were always here; these directions were meant to be theirs and this isn't typical, but this is _right_.

She comes apart beneath him, claw marks in his back as he smirks down at her, pulls her up and leads her to their bed.

()()()

Ten years later, they agree that success is subjective.

She's in New York.

He is, too.


End file.
